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Show 246 FORTY YEARS AMONG THE INDIANS. You can get fodder up at Juan Largos' near Florence, but there is none here." I answered, " Well we want to stop, and will have to put up with what there is. I see there is a little grass among the brush. We will have to feed all the more grain. We can get plenty of that, I suppose." " You had better not stay." He said, " If you turn your stock out they will be stolen from you. I have lived here ten years ; am friendly with the Indians, but they are the biggest thieves you ever saw. I tell you not to trust them. There are some poor people now in camp down there, two men and a woman. The d d thieves have stolen their stock and will not fetch it back unless they pay them five dollars a head, and as they have not got the money they are in a bad fix. The Indians will serve you the same way." We concluded that here was a chance to commence to work and do some good. We made camp in an opening among the brush. Soon* quite a number of Indians collected around camp. I told some of them to take our animals and watch them until night, then bring them in for their corn. We put a bell on one of the animals. I told the Indians not to take them so far we could not hear the bell. We went back to the trader's for some grain. I told him what we had done. He said I was like other " smart Alecks" that had just come among the Indians ; but that we would be in the same fix as the party was who had lost their stock. I told him we would not lose one of our animals; but that I believed I could induce the Indians to return those they had stolen from the poor people. He said, " You must be either crazy, or in colusion with the Indians." I told him we were neither. At feeding time all the animals were brought in. After feeding them they were |